How can you have a history of portable computing and not say a single thing about LCDs? The innovation that contributed most to adoption of notebook computers was the TFT screens with wider viewing angle and better colors. The article talks about the CNC used to make the sleek computers of today. But it wasn't any deficiency of manufacturing that made old laptops look boxy. They had to build the frames to block as much light as possible from interfering with the display.

"battery gains have been mostly linear for the last 25 years" After a whole paragraph about how Li-ion improves by ~5% per year. Reporters don't understand what exponential means!

This article is a bit lacking in details. The GRiD Compass is not given credit for being the first computer with a clamshell case (also a plasma screen). Also, not mentioning the Tandy TRS-80 Model 100 is a crime in a discussion of how the modern laptop came to be.

Previous submission from 2 weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9637015, which is funny because the article says it was published yesterday.

> It is the result of trillions of hours of R&D over tens of thousands of years.

Wow, I did not know that Ars was so much into hyperbole. That claim is just ridiculous.

25 years of laptops and we still have these damn screens on them that are physically attached to the computer.

Any laptop engineers out there: I want a screen that I can detach from the laptop, velcro it to a wall or to a stand and let me use my laptop with good posture.

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